Storyline Australia: Helen's War - Portrait of a Dissident

SBS is showing Anna Broinowski's portrait of her aunt, anti-nuclear activist Helen Caldicott, hot on the heels of its Sydney Film Festival screening and short cinema run. It's a fabulous documentary that works simultaneously as psychobiography (Caldicott grew up in an atmosphere of intellectual rigour and rage) and socio-political snapshot.

Caldicott's influence was at its height during the Reagan era and she remains steeped in Cold War rhetoric. She represents an old-world view sharply at odds with the post-September 11 climate, with its unquestioning nationalism and hard-edged militarism. It seems the oxygen has been sucked out of the protest movement and the only approach that cuts through these days is Michael Moore's bludgeoning wit. Caldicott, by contrast, comes across as hectoring and brittle.

This apparent disconnection is at the heart of the documentary. It is represented by the generational gap between Caldicott and Broinowski and addressed directly in a pivotal scene where Broinowski tells her aunt she is "too shrill". Caldicott's furious response is electrifying.

Caldicott stubbornly refuses to change her approach and over the course of a year - a year that saw the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq - she chips away at the American public's indifference and apathy. Ultimately, it is Broinowski who must re-evaluate her approach, concluding that "pessimism is a cop out".

Making this documentary was clearly difficult for both subject and filmmaker, but the results are stunning.